The present invention relates to rearview mirrors for vehicles and, more particularly, to rearview mirrors which are mounted to the side of the truck.
Vehicles, such as trailer trucks, pick-up trucks, and sport utility vehicles, are known to be provided with adjustable rearview mirrors mounted on both sides of the vehicle exterior. The mirrors are positioned forwardly of the driver to allow the driver to view the areas on the sides of the truck rearwardly of the mirrors. It is oftentimes desirable to adjust the position of the mirrors in order to accommodate different fields of view dependent on the length of the trailer being pulled or the height and positioning of individual drivers. The mirror may be adjusted by changing its angular position or by moving it laterally towards or away from the truck body.
Commonly owned U.S. Pat. No. 5,483,385 discloses a side-mounted truck mirror which can be adjusted laterally towards and away from the truck body. The mirror of the ""385 patent has a U-shaped member with the bight portion thereof pivotally mounted to the truck exterior and a pair of legs extending outwardly away from the truck exterior. A movable mirror housing has a pair of receiving portions for receiving the legs of the U-shaped member. The U-shaped member legs each have a pair of opposed openings and a resilient engagement element is mounted within each leg with prongs extending outwardly from the respective opposed openings. A pair of clamp members are mounted within the mirror housing and have a series of openings. When the mirror housing is mounted on these legs, the prongs of the engaging elements are biased into engagement with openings on each clamp member corresponding to the desired mirror position. To adjust the mirror position, the mirror housing can be manually engaged and slid along the legs such that the engaging element prongs index along the series of openings.
It can be appreciated that the type of mirror disclosed in the ""385 patent, while useful, limits the mirror adjustability to the positions defined by the openings on the clamp members. To obtain optimal viewing of certain fields of it necessary to both pivotally adjust and laterally adjust the mirror position with this type of arrangement. Also, truck vibrations may result in vibratory movement of the mirror as a result of any spacing permitted between the prongs and opening on the clamp member. Such vibratory movement can result in a distorted view of the objects reflected by the mirror.
A number of patents disclose mirror assemblies in which the lateral movement is not indexed or otherwise limited to a set number of positions. However, the lateral adjusting movements in these mirror assemblies can only be affected by manually releasing a locking device and then manually re-locking the device after adjusting the mirror. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,039,055 discloses a mirror assembly in which the mirror housing is slidably mounted on a tubular arm. A set screw engages the arm and locks the mirror housing in place. To adjust the mirror position, the set screw must be unscrewed and then re-screwed manually. The problem with this type of arrangement is that if the driver neglects to re-screw the set screw, the mirror may vibrate and distort rearward vision as a result of vehicle vibrations or move out of its position. Other patents disclosing related constructions are: U.K. Patent Application No. 2,193,940A, U.K. Patent Specification No. 1,373,052, U.S. Pat. No. 2,047,325, U.S. Pat. No. 3,482,811, and U.S. Pat. No. 2,526,306.
Another type of laterally adjustable mirror assembly is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,227,924. The mirror assembly has a mirror housing mounted on a support arm for lateral adjusting movement towards and away from the vehicle. However, to initiate such movement the driver must rotate the mirror housing approximately 180xc2x0 to a forwardly facing position. In the forwardly facing position, the mirror housing can then be moved laterally and locked in a desired position by rotating the mirror housing back to its normal, rearwardly facing position. This type of arrangement is undesirable because it is not intuitive to the driver that such rotation must be made before adjusting the mirror. Also, this arrangement can be rather inconvenient for a driver experimenting to find an appropriate mirror position because of the repeated rotating associated with repeated adjusting movements.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a truck mirror which is easily repositionable in the lateral direction of the truck body with an improved range of adjustability and configured to provide a clear rearview free from vibratory distortions. In order to achieve this object, the present invention provides a rearview mirror assembly for installation on the side of a motor vehicle. The assembly comprises a fixed support structure constructed and arranged to be mounted to the side of the motor vehicle exterior such that the assembly extends laterally outwardly with respect to the vehicle. A mirror housing mounting structure is mounted to the support structure for angular movement about a generally vertically extending axis with respect to the vehicle. A movable mirror housing is slidably mounted to the mounting structure. The housing has a mounting structure engaging surface engaging the mounting structure in tightly fit relation to limit relative vibratory movements between the mirror housing and the mounting structure as a result of vehicle vibrations. A mirror is mounted to the mirror housing. The mirror is positioned and configured to reflect images of objects disposed rearwardly of the mirror assembly to a driver seated within the motor vehicle. The tightly fit relation between the mounting structure engaging surfaces and the mounting structure is such that (1) the mirror housing can be repositioned laterally towards or away from the vehicle through an infinite range of positions while the mirror faces rearwardly with respect to the vehicle by manually applying lateral force to the housing directed towards or away from the vehicle sufficient to overcome the tightly fit relation without performing additional manual releasing operations and (2) the mirror housing will remain in a selected one of the positions absent application of lateral force to the mirror housing directed towards or away from the vehicle sufficient to overcome the tightly fit relation without performing additional manual securing operations.
Another aspect of the present invention relates to the angular movement of the mirror. It is often desirable to mount a mirror assembly in such a way that it yields and moves when an impact force is applied. By way of example, if the truck is driven too closely to a stationary object, the mirror will contact the object and yieldingly pivot towards the truck as a result of such impact. Such an arrangement is highly desirable because without such yielding, the mirror assembly may otherwise be broken off the truck body. The mirror assembly of the aforementioned ""385 patent has the bight portion of the U-shaped member engaged in a tight relation so as to prevent pivotal movement during operation of the truck and allow pivotal movement in the event of an impact force being applied. After such impact-initiated pivotal movement, however, the driver has to manually reposition the mirror assembly and such repositioning usually requires a number of adjusting movements before the assembly is in a satisfactory position. Thus, there exists a need for a mirror assembly which can be easily returned back to its original position after such impact-initiated pivotal movement without repeated repositioning.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,854,539 discloses a mirror assembly which can be returned back to its original position after impact-initiated pivotal movement. The assembly of the ""539 patent utilizes a plurality of rollers which engage openings in a detent carrier plate to maintain the mirror in a fixed angular position. The rollers are biased in an axial direction with respect to the pivot axis by a spring aligned coaxially with the pivot axis. The detent carrier plate has a plurality of detents which engage corresponding detents on the mirror support arm. U.S. Pat. 5,678,845 also discloses an axially biased arrangement using a plurality of rotating cams. These arrangements are rather complex and there exists a need for a simpler arrangment for affecting such a function.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a mirror assembly which can be easily repositioned to its original position and utilizes a simpler arrangement than those using axially-biased engaging structures. In order to achieve this objective, there is provided a rearview mirror assembly for installation on the side of a motor vehicle. The assembly comprises a fixed support structure constructed and arranged to be mounted to the side of the motor vehicle exterior such that the assembly extends laterally outwardly with respect to the vehicle. A mirror housing mounting structure is mounted to the support structure for angular movement about a generally vertically extending axis with respect to the vehicle. A mirror housing is mounted to the mounting structure and a mirror is mounted to the mirror housing to reflect images of objects disposed rearwardly of the mirror assembly to a driver seated within the motor vehicle. The support structure has a resiliently yieldingly deformable mounting structure engaging structure and the mounting structure has an engageable portion facing generally radially with respect to the axis. The deformable engaging structure is constructed and arranged to engage the engageable portion in a cooperating relationship so as to yieldingly maintain the mirror mounting structure and the mirror housing in a fixed angular position with respect to the axis. The deformable engaging structure being constructed and arranged such that application of a sufficient impact force to the mirror housing pivots the mounting structure relative to the support structure so as to yieldingly deform the engaging structure in a generally radial direction with respect to the axis and disengage the engageable portion and the engaging structure from one another to thereby allow the mirror housing to move pivotally in the direction of the impact force. The deformable engaging structure is configured such that the mirror housing can thereafter be returned to the fixed angular position by pivotally moving the mirror housing opposite the direction of the impact force until the engaging structure and the engageable portion are aligned and the deformable engaging structure resiliently returns in a generally radial direction with respect to the axis to the engaged cooperating relationship.